ENES232 | PlanetTerp

Information	Review
Catherine Hamel ENES232 Expecting an A Anonymous 11/21/2024	ENES232 might be one of the best taught and structured courses at this university. Having Hamel makes it definitely the best taught and structured courses at this university.
Jarred Young ENES232 Expecting an A Anonymous 11/09/2024	Dr. J is not a very good lecturer, I often left class with many questions and had to relearn the material. However, he makes up for this by being very very helpful one-on-one and by keeping his lectures and studios engaging. Young is the type to answer your question with another question to test your understanding, and even though this can be annoying at first he is very good at helping you find an answer and understand difficult concepts. Young also posts lecture videos online with corresponding notes for every lecture and it's really helpful if you need to go back if you missed something. He curved the class a lot and is a really nice guy.
Catherine Hamel ENES232 Expecting a C+ Anonymous 10/14/2024	This is the best professor I had at UMD. There are no criticisms one could have. I wish all of my courses could be taught in the same manner with the same passion.
Catherine Hamel ENES232 Expecting an A Anonymous 06/01/2024	She is the BEST. If you you really wanna enjoy thermo and understand it easily just take her section without any hesitation.
Raymond Sedwick ENES232 Expecting an A Anonymous 05/24/2024	I loved how he posted lecture videos so we could reference information outside of class. He was always so nice and always had a smile on his face. He obviously knew the information so well and was very good at teaching it and trying to find the best ways for students to remember and understand the concepts. He also has six cats which is pretty cool, as well as the story behind them. Anyway, I would very much recommend Dr. Sedwick.
Jarred Young ENES232 Expecting an A Anonymous 05/17/2024	Very polished notes, caring and helpful during office hours. Made the material feel very easy
Kevin Calabro ENES232 Expecting an A Anonymous 05/15/2024	My favorite teacher Ive had by far. His lectures are informative yet direct, his teaching style is rigid but patient, his grading is meticulous yet accurate. You will come out of his classes thinking "yeah, I deserved the grade that I got", because he is extremely fair and expects you to know the course material because he has taught it to you so well. He could teach mechanics to a kindergartener and thermodynamics to a houseplant. I have taken three courses with him and he has done a fantastic job instructing every single one. The best part is he is such a decent dude. Super respectful to his students and always willing to give even the most objectively "that kid has not been paying attention" questions a sincere and thorough answer. Only professor I would wake up at 8am for throughout the entire semester. Take this man if you have the chance.
Raymond Sedwick ENES232 Expecting an A Anonymous 05/11/2024	After looking at his reviews, I was a little scared to take this professor for thermo but I was pleasantly surprised. Compared to many other Thermo professors, Sedwick arguably has some of--if not the best and most organized notes. Instead of lectures you watch very detailed lecture videos and come to class with any questions about that. This is where I would say the main downside of the class is. The lecture videos can be pretty tedious to get through, especially by the end of the semester. I sometimes would just look at the slides he posted instead of watching the videos just because that would shave off like 1.5+ hours of time. Still, he's great at explaining things, super approachable, and was absolutely a professor I'd take again.
Catherine Hamel ENES232 Expecting an A Anonymous 04/14/2024	I had a 9am and never skipped once, she is INCREDIBLE.
Joshua Cocker ENES232 Anonymous 03/14/2024	Amazing professor in every sense. Absolutely cannot go wrong with Josh.
Catherine Hamel ENES232 Anonymous 02/29/2024	Amazing professor. Clearly passionate about teaching and ensuring that you understand the content easily. BTW, the actual exam is much harder than the practice ones.
Catherine Hamel ENES232 Expecting an A Anonymous 01/26/2024	Ditto the other comments.
Catherine Hamel ENES232 Expecting an A- acthakur 01/24/2024	Absolutely and easily the most helpful professor I have ever had. Do not skip out on her office hours they are easily the most helpful resource she offers. Depending on your TA luck, they also have great office hours. The lectures themselves are mediocrely helpful, but that's more the nature of the content than the professor. If you are struggling just talk to her and she will almost ensure that you are all caught up in your understanding. Again, do NOT skip out on her office hours, I would have an A+ if I had started going before the first exam.
Catherine Hamel ENES232 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 12/15/2023	If you have the opportunity to choose prof. Hamel as your instructor for any course, please do yourself a favor and choose her. I took her thermodynamics course in the fall of 2022, 1 year ago, and I am still close with her today. During the time I had her I could sense that she cared not only for success in her class, but in my career as a whole. At the time I was new to the university and was navigating through the different engineering resources in terms of internship searching. She introduced me to careers4engineers and how to navigate that, and she was always encouraging me to ask her questions not related to the course if I had any. Through this class I feel like I built not only thermodynamics knowledge but an important and meaningful connection. I have asked her for multiple recommendations and she happily did all of them on top of her day-to-day work and busy schedule. She is a genuine individual and as long as you show her that you are willing to put in the work to understand the materials, she will literally bend over backwards to help you succeed.
Catherine Hamel ENES232 Expecting a B+ Anonymous 12/07/2023	Goated. Absolutely amazing professor. Good notes, lectures, extremely helpful inside and outside of the classroom. If you do not have her as a professor at some point, you're missing out.
Paul Anderson ENES232 Expecting an A Anonymous 10/04/2023	Paul is a great professor and a great guy in general. You can really tell he cares about teaching and wants everybody to succeed. Lectures are well prepared, the homework assignments are fair, practice exams get posted, and you get 2 tries on every exam, so if you want a good grade in this class it is not that hard as long as you put in some effort.
Paul Anderson ENES232 Expecting an A- Anonymous 06/06/2023	Dr Anderson kept us engaged and excited for the materials the whole semester. The grading scheme is pretty frustrating and it feels like every week we had an exam. But he grades the project, HW, and regrades leniently. The final was much easier than the midterms. Make sure you know your multiple choice conceptual questions because that makes up a lot of points.
Jarred Young ENES232 Expecting an A Anonymous 05/27/2023	Great guy, he tells jokes and is very generous and caring to the students.
Paul Anderson ENES232 Expecting an A- Anonymous 05/25/2023	Dr. Anderson gives his lectures well and typically explains things clearly. At times, he had a little trouble wording a topic, but it was his first time teaching the class this semester but have to keep in mind this was his first time teaching the class. He's extremely friendly, and if you ever have a question after class or go to office hours, he's great at answering them and explaining it clearly in that type of setting.
Jarred Young ENES232 Expecting an A Anonymous 05/22/2023	Dr. Young is a very genuine professor; he wants you to succeed and tries to help you do so, but will jokingly call you out for dumb questions. His lectures are fine, but you can honestly get by with the course notes he provides on ELMS. They're very neat and available in both worksheet and video format, so basically the entire course is available to you from the start. Overall, funny guy, very organized, no complaints. Only real downside is he's one of those "let's try that again" people when the class doesn't do a passionate enough "good morning." Learned a lot, though, and I would take him again. As for class structure: One weekly homework assignment that usually takes 1-3 hours, and one weekly classwork for the studio sections (posted online). Lectures and studio sections are not mandatory, but occasionally there will be some unannounced extra credit opportunity you can only get by attending, so don't skip. 3 midterms + a final, but the midterms are taken two times each (so midterm 1 was actually 1A and 1B, with 1B being 1 week after 1A). There is no partial credit, but they grade them within 1-2 days and you do regrade requests on Gradescope - 90% of points back for numerical errors (ex. calculator mistype), 20% back for conceptual errors (you didn't know what you were doing), and an additional 10% back for sanity checks ("my answer clearly doesn't make sense and this is why"). The higher grade of each set of midterms is kept. The system sounds harsh but can be quite forgiving, as the questions are typically pretty formulaic. The final DID grade with partial credit (and it was almost exactly like the practice final), and there was an unspecified (not shown in ELMS) curve for the course grade, and he doesn't seem to do minus grades (A- = A). Bumped my 88 to a flat A. There's also a final project that looks like a lot but was graded quite leniently.
Jarred Young ENES232 Expecting an A Anonymous 05/16/2023	Chill
Paul Anderson ENES232 Expecting an A Anonymous 05/12/2023	Professor Anderson taught thermodynamics in a way I could understand, and he was able to answer any questions I had. He also had a lot of energy in each class, which I thought was a nice bonus. I will note that the answers given by the instructors on the course piazza were often vague, but answers given after class or during office hours were pretty direct.
Raymond Sedwick ENES232 Anonymous 04/20/2023	Sedwick, from what I can understand from friends in other sections, runs the class a bit differently. Other professors have the class set up so that you have two lectures, and a discussion with graded group work. Sedwick has it set up so that you only have one lecture and one discussion with no graded discussion worksheet. Instead, he has it so that you watch and write notes for two ~50 minute videos a week due before lecture. This comes with both upsides and downsides which I'll get to later. As far as a lecturer, professor Sedwick has a high expectation for student engagement in the course and material, he is a strong believer in deriving formulas and understanding where they came from opposed to memorizing just the formulas. As such do not expect a formula sheet in any of the exams. His lectures mostly review the content from the lecture videos, and provide an opportunity for questions. He answers questions very thoroughly, what I would think were quick questions have gotten lengthy explanations. This means you'll definitely not come away with any misunderstandings if you pay attention, but also slows down the pace of class a bit. As for the upsides and downsides I mentioned earlier, the lecture videos mean 12% of your grade is free points for writing notes, and you don't have to go to class one day a week. The downside is they can be very tedious and take about 40-80% longer than the videos themselves since he expects you to write all the writing on the slides verbatim for full credit, and there is a lot to copy down (granted I do tend to write slow). I think overall I have put in more time in Sedwick's class than I would have put in other sections, but came away with a better understanding of thermo as a result. Overall i'd recommend him if you are OK with a more no-nonsense type professor and want a good understanding of thermo and are willing to put in the requisite time.
Catherine Hamel ENES232 Expecting an A- Anonymous 04/17/2023	Catherine is the best engineering professor I have had so far. She truly cares about her students learning and even takes the time to learn all of our names. Her lecture style is good and not just reading off slides. She does the examples with us, and takes the time to fully explain and answer questions. The class isn't bad, you get to take all of the midterms twice, but there is no partial credit which kind of stinks. They are pretty lenient when grading homework and studios, however they grade the final project harshly so make sure you put effort into that, especially the formatting.
Raymond Sedwick ENES232 Expecting an A- Anonymous 03/22/2023	I had a terrible experience with this professor. Snarky doesn't begin to describe how arrogant he is. He was very rude and unprofessional towards me, including with direct insults. Furthermore, he had a policy where he would force us to take notes on his lecture videos and then force us to submit pictures of those notes twice a week, while still making us come to class by taking attendance. In class, he said nothing of value, only inefficiently explained example problems that he already thoroughly covered in the video lectures. He also refused to answer my questions in class about the material, instead replying, "look at your notes again," several times. If I had the answer in my notes I wouldn't have asked! If you want a professor who wastes your time, is rude and mean-spirited, and is generally unhelpful and wants nothing more than to satisfy his own enormous ego, this is the professor for you.
Raymond Sedwick ENES232 Expecting an A Anonymous 03/07/2023	I have a good grade in this course in spite, not because, of his teaching, and I am shocked that he has any positive reviews, since my experience with Raymond was terrible. He is an incompetent lecturer and grader, rude, and refuses to answer basic questions, telling students to just look at their notes again. Of course, if they had the answer in their notes, the wouldn't ask! Additionally, he has this extremely annoying policy of forcing students to take notes on his mind-numbingly boring video lectures, and then submit pictures of those notes, and still forces us to come to class where he not only takes attendance, but also gives useless, slow paced lectures which cover the exact same material as the video lectures. All of these are just some examples of his infuriating behavior. I would give this "professor" 0/5 stars if I could and 5/5 for wasting my time. Avoid him at all costs if you want a professor that actually teaches anything and doesn't assign endless busywork. Thank you Sedwick for making thermodynamics my least favorite class of my college career.
Catherine Hamel ENES232 Expecting an A Anonymous 12/24/2022	Don't even need to explain. You need this professor period. But do watch out for the final project it's werid
Catherine Hamel ENES232 Expecting an A Anonymous 12/22/2022	Goated.
Catherine Hamel ENES232 Expecting an A Anonymous 08/20/2022	Professor Hamel is the best professor I've had because she treats her students like people, not numbers. She goes beyond her call of duty in terms of helping students and holding office hours. She not only knows her material, but she also knows how to teach it well. She understands her students and concerns the class may have.
Catherine Hamel ENES232 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 08/19/2022	Professor Hamel is probably one of the only professors I’ve had who actually puts in visible effort into her students. I had her over the Summer and despite the short time she had to give us material, she put in her best effort to make sure everyone understood the topics. She also gave us multiple opportunities to receive extra credit to boost our grades. Hands down one of the best professors I’ve had so far.
Catherine Hamel ENES232 Expecting an A Anonymous 05/19/2022	Catherine is the best engineering professor I have ever had, without a doubt. Her friendliness and genuine care for her students make it a pleasure to interact with her. She goes above and beyond to be helpful in office hours and on the course Piazza. Thermo is a difficult subject, but all assignments and exams are fair. It may take a significant amount of effort to do well because of the nature of the material, but it is definitely possible, especially because Catherine is such a good professor. She explains things clearly, takes questions, and will slow down or repeat things if asked. The combination of how good she is at explaining difficult material and how much she genuinely cares about your success make this class thoroughly enjoyable.
Jarred Young ENES232 Expecting a D+ Anonymous 04/26/2022	Decent guy, but bad lecturer and harsh grader. Lectures go over basic material with too many equations that you're expected to memorize. Exams have no partial credit and expect to lose sets of 10 points for sign errors that are inconsistent or other simple mistakes.
Jarred Young ENES232 Anonymous 03/12/2022	Seriously don't understand the praise for this guy. I enjoy his humor and that's about it. If you want to watch someone slowly write definitions on the board for 45 minutes, not 50 because he's usually late, this is your guy. If you want to cover one extremely easy in class example per week that is nothing like the assignments or exams, he's your guy. If you enjoy the childish game of the lecturer demanding repeat enthusiastic "good mornings" before starting lecture, also your guy. If you want to lose 20 points on a 30 point question because of one error, he's definitely your guy. The grading for these exams is so absurd. "conceptual fluency" is a joke. Incredible that you can get all the right numbers yet get 0 points on a 30 point question because you did or didn't use a negative sign, extremely ironic when other universities teach this class with opposite definitions of heat and work in/out. If the concepts are so important, why is so much time spent on definition, not concepts or examples? The TA is extremely arrogant and generally not helpful at all. Literally laughs at students questions, then goes back with Young and they laugh about things together. What a great environment for hard studio assignments. You can still easily get a good grade since there's exam retakes plus extra credit, but that says nothing about the quality of the professor IMO. Leaves a ton to be desired.
Christopher Cadou ENES232 Anonymous 01/01/2022	Lectures are all over the place and hard to follow. Often gets behind on material resulting in learning hw topics the day it’s due, or learning exam topics the day before. Not very forgiving or helpful. Makes an already hard class 10x harder.
Christopher Cadou ENES232 Expecting a P Anonymous 07/11/2021	lets be real if this professor can learn how to teach that would be amazing. I couldn’t tolerate his lectures during online school at all because he just kept scrolling his screen and sharing hundreds of equations without solving any relevant problems. His exams were hard af so people had to retake it every other week.
Christopher Cadou ENES232 Anonymous 06/18/2021	Worst professor I have ever encountered. He was literally driving while zoom lectures and proctoring during exams. Picking up family members is not professional at all while exams and he wasn't reading his emails on time. Worst class just because of the professor take Kathrene or Young and it will be so much better!!
Catherine Hamel ENES232 Expecting an A- Anonymous 05/20/2021	Professor Hamel is one of the best ENES teachers I have had. The course content is very interesting to learn about but is also complex. However, Hamel is able to make the content understandable and not that bad. The grading method, conceptual fluency, can be very frustrating at times and probably was more annoying than the content itself. Professor Hamel is one of the very few teachers that want to connect with her students and did so by plays music at the start of class, shared thermodynamic memes, and talked with her students briefly during studio instead of just the assigned work. The memes can be dry at times, but that just shows that Hamel really wants to connect with her students and to make the course as enjoyable and interesting as possible. If you put in the work, ask for help, and do the homework and studios, you are on track for success in the course.
Catherine Hamel ENES232 Anonymous 05/20/2021	One of the best professors at this school. She manages to teach a complicated and confusing topic in a way that makes it enjoyable and straightforward. The grading method takes some getting use to but it helps in the long run.
Jarred Young ENES232 Expecting an A Anonymous 04/08/2021	Young is the GOAT Take any and every class you can with him. Had Young for 102 and 232. He was great in both and makes material understandable. Also, Extra Credit is life saver!
Jarred Young ENES232 Anonymous 12/17/2020	Cares about his students. Gives a very generous opportunity for extra credit & very willing to explain confusing concepts/help with classwork assignments. Overall a really good experience with him for an online class.
Catherine Hamel ENES232 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 05/23/2020	Professor Hamel is one of the best professors in the Maryland capstone department. She, not only cares a lot for her student's success, but has the capability of actually teaching her students, allowing them to be successful. Also, a very engaging professor. If at all possible, take this professor for any engineer course possible.
Christopher Cadou ENES232 Anonymous 07/01/2019	Cadou gets a bad rep but from my experience, he's not as bad as people make him out to be. He goes over MOST of the concepts which is usually good enough and prepares you decently enough for exams if you actually try in discussion and re-do the homeworks, etc.
Catherine Hamel ENES232 Expecting a C+ Anonymous 01/20/2019	One of the best professors I've ever had, she took one of the most dreaded engineering courses and made it approachable and enjoyable. You can do well in her class as long as you put in an honest effort, but be aware that there is very little curve for the class so you have to do well. I wish I went to lecture more, she even brings candy sometimes. There are so many nuances to this class that even if you do well on the homework, you can still mess up the exam due to small things. Make sure to show up to lecture to learn the tricks around these nuanced things
Catherine Hamel ENES232 Anonymous 12/11/2018	Really just an all around great professor. She's extremely friendly and helpful, and does her best to make sure her students succeed. Her lecture is easy to follow and engaging.
Kevin Calabro ENES232 Expecting an A- Anonymous 06/02/2018	Kevin is probably one of the best engineering professors I’ve had the pleasure of taking. Understand, however, that Thermodynamics is not by any means a pushover class, and so expect to struggle through problems that sometimes take hours. Kevin’s philosophy about homework’s is that if you struggle through it and complete harder questions on your own then you’ll be very well prepared for the exams, which could not be more true. Throughout the class I thought to myself “man this is just a huge pain in the ass why do I have to do this?” Then came the first midterm and I got an A. Material ramps up in difficulty, homework’s are even more irritating and challenging, then came the second midterm and I got an even higher grade. I honestly don’t think I would’ve done half as well in this class had I had any other professor. Always take Kevin if you can.
Raymond Sedwick ENES232 Expecting an A- aeroterp 01/02/2018	Dr. Sedwick was overall a pretty good professor and nice guy. His lectures were sometimes difficult to follow, but he was willing to help students out in class by answering questions. I sometimes felt that I had to teach myself some of the material. The homework assignments were the most useful tool for learning the material. He gave the numerical answers to the homeworks, but not solutions. This was helpful in checking work. Quizzes were given during discussion. Most of them were pretty difficult and had low averages. Exams were fair and slightly easier than the homework problems.
Kevin Calabro ENES232 Expecting a B+ cloak 04/25/2016	Kevin (because that's what he wants you to call him) is by far the best teacher I have had at UMD. His teaching style, note-taking style (exactly what you need, neatly organized, and nothing more or less), and general care about his students as people made him an amazing teacher. I am not one of those people who goes to office hours and tries to talk to my professor because frankly I don't usually need to and don't care, but Kevin is someone who I know actually cares about how well I do and how much I learn and is approachable and helpful. He is one of the few engineering professors who is actually a good person as well as amazing teacher and I 100% recommend him to anyone for any course that he teaches.
Kristen Hines ENES232 Anonymous 08/18/2015	Hands down once of the worst women I have ever encountered. She was incredibly condesending, insulting, and unprofessional throughout the whole course. She once told me I reminded her of her old boss, because he "was retook thermo and was stupid too." She would insult and gossip about students when they left the room to go to the bathroom, and once spent ten minutes of class explaining how affermative action is the only reason UMD has female engineering students. She is a living walking nightmare; aviod at all costs.
Kristen Hines ENES232 Anonymous 05/09/2015	I had Hines for 232 and yes she definitely knows what she's talking about but she is very condescending. I went into office hours for the very first time on the first week to ask for help, and when I asked my question she looked at me like I was crazy and that I should've known the answer. If a student asks for help I think that a professor should be wiling to help and not criticize. On top of that, she told me in front of several students that she think I should drop the class. I ended up getting a 92% and therefore a 79.7 in the class, but she still gave me a C. And when I asked her about it, she sent a mass email to all of her sections pointing me out and saying that students like me should not be begging for a grade. I wasn't begging, I just thought that because of my improvement I at least deserved a B in the class.
Kristen Hines ENES232 Expecting a B cheesecake 10/17/2014	She's a quirky teacher with a cool personality who clearly loves to teach thermo and wants to see her students succeed. That being said, she is not a great lecturer and her notes are very messy. I find it hard to follow her and consequently feel unprepared and lost when doing homework assignments. I would try to take other professors like Calabro, but she is the only one teaching this semester.
Kevin Calabro ENES232 Expecting a B parade 07/31/2014	Kevin is a great lecturer and I really felt comfortable with the material learned from Thermodynamics. However, he is a rather strict grader and gave almost no curve in the class even though there was one exam where our class average was 10% lower than both the other teacher's class averages. I ended up getting a B despite doing very well throughout the semester and I would've imagined I was at least top 15% in the class.
Chandrasekhar Thamire ENES232 Expecting an A soheikitsune 05/19/2013	Thamire made this class much clearer than the other professors from what I understand, and also made sure that we knew the material before moving on. I would definitely recommend taking him for any course that you can.

Catherine Hamel
ENES232

Expecting an A
Anonymous
11/21/2024

ENES232 might be one of the best taught and structured courses at this university. Having Hamel makes it definitely the best taught and structured courses at this university.

Jarred Young
ENES232

Expecting an A
Anonymous
11/09/2024

Dr. J is not a very good lecturer, I often left class with many questions and had to relearn the material. However, he makes up for this by being very very helpful one-on-one and by keeping his lectures and studios engaging. Young is the type to answer your question with another question to test your understanding, and even though this can be annoying at first he is very good at helping you find an answer and understand difficult concepts. Young also posts lecture videos online with corresponding notes for every lecture and it's really helpful if you need to go back if you missed something. He curved the class a lot and is a really nice guy.

Catherine Hamel
ENES232

Expecting a C+
Anonymous
10/14/2024

This is the best professor I had at UMD. There are no criticisms one could have. I wish all of my courses could be taught in the same manner with the same passion.

Catherine Hamel
ENES232

Expecting an A
Anonymous
06/01/2024

She is the BEST. If you you really wanna enjoy thermo and understand it easily just take her section without any hesitation.

Raymond Sedwick
ENES232

Expecting an A
Anonymous
05/24/2024

I loved how he posted lecture videos so we could reference information outside of class. He was always so nice and always had a smile on his face. He obviously knew the information so well and was very good at teaching it and trying to find the best ways for students to remember and understand the concepts. He also has six cats which is pretty cool, as well as the story behind them. Anyway, I would very much recommend Dr. Sedwick.

Jarred Young
ENES232

Expecting an A
Anonymous
05/17/2024

Very polished notes, caring and helpful during office hours. Made the material feel very easy

Kevin Calabro
ENES232

Expecting an A
Anonymous
05/15/2024

My favorite teacher Ive had by far. His lectures are informative yet direct, his teaching style is rigid but patient, his grading is meticulous yet accurate. You will come out of his classes thinking "yeah, I deserved the grade that I got", because he is extremely fair and expects you to know the course material because he has taught it to you so well. He could teach mechanics to a kindergartener and thermodynamics to a houseplant. I have taken three courses with him and he has done a fantastic job instructing every single one. The best part is he is such a decent dude. Super respectful to his students and always willing to give even the most objectively "that kid has not been paying attention" questions a sincere and thorough answer. Only professor I would wake up at 8am for throughout the entire semester. Take this man if you have the chance.

Raymond Sedwick
ENES232

Expecting an A
Anonymous
05/11/2024

After looking at his reviews, I was a little scared to take this professor for thermo but I was pleasantly surprised. Compared to many other Thermo professors, Sedwick arguably has some of--if not the best and most organized notes. Instead of lectures you watch very detailed lecture videos and come to class with any questions about that. This is where I would say the main downside of the class is. The lecture videos can be pretty tedious to get through, especially by the end of the semester. I sometimes would just look at the slides he posted instead of watching the videos just because that would shave off like 1.5+ hours of time. Still, he's great at explaining things, super approachable, and was absolutely a professor I'd take again.

Catherine Hamel
ENES232

Expecting an A
Anonymous
04/14/2024

I had a 9am and never skipped once, she is INCREDIBLE.

Joshua Cocker
ENES232

Anonymous
03/14/2024

Amazing professor in every sense. Absolutely cannot go wrong with Josh.

Catherine Hamel
ENES232

Anonymous
02/29/2024

Amazing professor. Clearly passionate about teaching and ensuring that you understand the content easily. BTW, the actual exam is much harder than the practice ones.

Catherine Hamel
ENES232

Expecting an A
Anonymous
01/26/2024

Ditto the other comments.

Catherine Hamel
ENES232

Expecting an A-
acthakur
01/24/2024

Absolutely and easily the most helpful professor I have ever had. Do not skip out on her office hours they are easily the most helpful resource she offers. Depending on your TA luck, they also have great office hours. The lectures themselves are mediocrely helpful, but that's more the nature of the content than the professor. If you are struggling just talk to her and she will almost ensure that you are all caught up in your understanding. Again, do NOT skip out on her office hours, I would have an A+ if I had started going before the first exam.

Catherine Hamel
ENES232

Expecting an A+
Anonymous
12/15/2023

If you have the opportunity to choose prof. Hamel as your instructor for any course, please do yourself a favor and choose her. I took her thermodynamics course in the fall of 2022, 1 year ago, and I am still close with her today. During the time I had her I could sense that she cared not only for success in her class, but in my career as a whole. At the time I was new to the university and was navigating through the different engineering resources in terms of internship searching. She introduced me to careers4engineers and how to navigate that, and she was always encouraging me to ask her questions not related to the course if I had any. Through this class I feel like I built not only thermodynamics knowledge but an important and meaningful connection. I have asked her for multiple recommendations and she happily did all of them on top of her day-to-day work and busy schedule. She is a genuine individual and as long as you show her that you are willing to put in the work to understand the materials, she will literally bend over backwards to help you succeed.

Catherine Hamel
ENES232

Expecting a B+
Anonymous
12/07/2023

Goated. Absolutely amazing professor. Good notes, lectures, extremely helpful inside and outside of the classroom. If you do not have her as a professor at some point, you're missing out.

Paul Anderson
ENES232

Expecting an A
Anonymous
10/04/2023

Paul is a great professor and a great guy in general. You can really tell he cares about teaching and wants everybody to succeed. Lectures are well prepared, the homework assignments are fair, practice exams get posted, and you get 2 tries on every exam, so if you want a good grade in this class it is not that hard as long as you put in some effort.

Paul Anderson
ENES232

Expecting an A-
Anonymous
06/06/2023

Dr Anderson kept us engaged and excited for the materials the whole semester. The grading scheme is pretty frustrating and it feels like every week we had an exam. But he grades the project, HW, and regrades leniently. The final was much easier than the midterms. Make sure you know your multiple choice conceptual questions because that makes up a lot of points.

Jarred Young
ENES232

Expecting an A
Anonymous
05/27/2023

Great guy, he tells jokes and is very generous and caring to the students.

Paul Anderson
ENES232

Expecting an A-
Anonymous
05/25/2023

Dr. Anderson gives his lectures well and typically explains things clearly. At times, he had a little trouble wording a topic, but it was his first time teaching the class this semester but have to keep in mind this was his first time teaching the class. He's extremely friendly, and if you ever have a question after class or go to office hours, he's great at answering them and explaining it clearly in that type of setting.

Jarred Young
ENES232

Expecting an A
Anonymous
05/22/2023

Dr. Young is a very genuine professor; he wants you to succeed and tries to help you do so, but will jokingly call you out for dumb questions. His lectures are fine, but you can honestly get by with the course notes he provides on ELMS. They're very neat and available in both worksheet and video format, so basically the entire course is available to you from the start. Overall, funny guy, very organized, no complaints. Only real downside is he's one of those "let's try that again" people when the class doesn't do a passionate enough "good morning." Learned a lot, though, and I would take him again. As for class structure: One weekly homework assignment that usually takes 1-3 hours, and one weekly classwork for the studio sections (posted online). Lectures and studio sections are not mandatory, but occasionally there will be some unannounced extra credit opportunity you can only get by attending, so don't skip. 3 midterms + a final, but the midterms are taken two times each (so midterm 1 was actually 1A and 1B, with 1B being 1 week after 1A). There is no partial credit, but they grade them within 1-2 days and you do regrade requests on Gradescope - 90% of points back for numerical errors (ex. calculator mistype), 20% back for conceptual errors (you didn't know what you were doing), and an additional 10% back for sanity checks ("my answer clearly doesn't make sense and this is why"). The higher grade of each set of midterms is kept. The system sounds harsh but can be quite forgiving, as the questions are typically pretty formulaic. The final DID grade with partial credit (and it was almost exactly like the practice final), and there was an unspecified (not shown in ELMS) curve for the course grade, and he doesn't seem to do minus grades (A- = A). Bumped my 88 to a flat A. There's also a final project that looks like a lot but was graded quite leniently.

Jarred Young
ENES232

Expecting an A
Anonymous
05/16/2023

Chill

Paul Anderson
ENES232

Expecting an A
Anonymous
05/12/2023

Professor Anderson taught thermodynamics in a way I could understand, and he was able to answer any questions I had. He also had a lot of energy in each class, which I thought was a nice bonus. I will note that the answers given by the instructors on the course piazza were often vague, but answers given after class or during office hours were pretty direct.

Raymond Sedwick
ENES232

Anonymous
04/20/2023

Sedwick, from what I can understand from friends in other sections, runs the class a bit differently. Other professors have the class set up so that you have two lectures, and a discussion with graded group work. Sedwick has it set up so that you only have one lecture and one discussion with no graded discussion worksheet. Instead, he has it so that you watch and write notes for two ~50 minute videos a week due before lecture. This comes with both upsides and downsides which I'll get to later. As far as a lecturer, professor Sedwick has a high expectation for student engagement in the course and material, he is a strong believer in deriving formulas and understanding where they came from opposed to memorizing just the formulas. As such do not expect a formula sheet in any of the exams. His lectures mostly review the content from the lecture videos, and provide an opportunity for questions. He answers questions very thoroughly, what I would think were quick questions have gotten lengthy explanations. This means you'll definitely not come away with any misunderstandings if you pay attention, but also slows down the pace of class a bit. As for the upsides and downsides I mentioned earlier, the lecture videos mean 12% of your grade is free points for writing notes, and you don't have to go to class one day a week. The downside is they can be very tedious and take about 40-80% longer than the videos themselves since he expects you to write all the writing on the slides verbatim for full credit, and there is a lot to copy down (granted I do tend to write slow). I think overall I have put in more time in Sedwick's class than I would have put in other sections, but came away with a better understanding of thermo as a result. Overall i'd recommend him if you are OK with a more no-nonsense type professor and want a good understanding of thermo and are willing to put in the requisite time.

Catherine Hamel
ENES232

Expecting an A-
Anonymous
04/17/2023

Catherine is the best engineering professor I have had so far. She truly cares about her students learning and even takes the time to learn all of our names. Her lecture style is good and not just reading off slides. She does the examples with us, and takes the time to fully explain and answer questions. The class isn't bad, you get to take all of the midterms twice, but there is no partial credit which kind of stinks. They are pretty lenient when grading homework and studios, however they grade the final project harshly so make sure you put effort into that, especially the formatting.

Raymond Sedwick
ENES232

Expecting an A-
Anonymous
03/22/2023

I had a terrible experience with this professor. Snarky doesn't begin to describe how arrogant he is. He was very rude and unprofessional towards me, including with direct insults. Furthermore, he had a policy where he would force us to take notes on his lecture videos and then force us to submit pictures of those notes twice a week, while still making us come to class by taking attendance. In class, he said nothing of value, only inefficiently explained example problems that he already thoroughly covered in the video lectures. He also refused to answer my questions in class about the material, instead replying, "look at your notes again," several times. If I had the answer in my notes I wouldn't have asked! If you want a professor who wastes your time, is rude and mean-spirited, and is generally unhelpful and wants nothing more than to satisfy his own enormous ego, this is the professor for you.

Raymond Sedwick
ENES232

Expecting an A
Anonymous
03/07/2023

I have a good grade in this course in spite, not because, of his teaching, and I am shocked that he has any positive reviews, since my experience with Raymond was terrible. He is an incompetent lecturer and grader, rude, and refuses to answer basic questions, telling students to just look at their notes again. Of course, if they had the answer in their notes, the wouldn't ask! Additionally, he has this extremely annoying policy of forcing students to take notes on his mind-numbingly boring video lectures, and then submit pictures of those notes, and still forces us to come to class where he not only takes attendance, but also gives useless, slow paced lectures which cover the exact same material as the video lectures. All of these are just some examples of his infuriating behavior. I would give this "professor" 0/5 stars if I could and 5/5 for wasting my time. Avoid him at all costs if you want a professor that actually teaches anything and doesn't assign endless busywork. Thank you Sedwick for making thermodynamics my least favorite class of my college career.

Catherine Hamel
ENES232

Expecting an A
Anonymous
12/24/2022

Don't even need to explain. You need this professor period. But do watch out for the final project it's werid

Catherine Hamel
ENES232

Expecting an A
Anonymous
12/22/2022

Goated.

Catherine Hamel
ENES232

Expecting an A
Anonymous
08/20/2022

Professor Hamel is the best professor I've had because she treats her students like people, not numbers. She goes beyond her call of duty in terms of helping students and holding office hours. She not only knows her material, but she also knows how to teach it well. She understands her students and concerns the class may have.

Catherine Hamel
ENES232

Expecting an A+
Anonymous
08/19/2022

Professor Hamel is probably one of the only professors I’ve had who actually puts in visible effort into her students. I had her over the Summer and despite the short time she had to give us material, she put in her best effort to make sure everyone understood the topics. She also gave us multiple opportunities to receive extra credit to boost our grades. Hands down one of the best professors I’ve had so far.

Catherine Hamel
ENES232

Expecting an A
Anonymous
05/19/2022

Catherine is the best engineering professor I have ever had, without a doubt. Her friendliness and genuine care for her students make it a pleasure to interact with her. She goes above and beyond to be helpful in office hours and on the course Piazza. Thermo is a difficult subject, but all assignments and exams are fair. It may take a significant amount of effort to do well because of the nature of the material, but it is definitely possible, especially because Catherine is such a good professor. She explains things clearly, takes questions, and will slow down or repeat things if asked. The combination of how good she is at explaining difficult material and how much she genuinely cares about your success make this class thoroughly enjoyable.

Jarred Young
ENES232

Expecting a D+
Anonymous
04/26/2022

Decent guy, but bad lecturer and harsh grader. Lectures go over basic material with too many equations that you're expected to memorize. Exams have no partial credit and expect to lose sets of 10 points for sign errors that are inconsistent or other simple mistakes.

Jarred Young
ENES232

Anonymous
03/12/2022

Seriously don't understand the praise for this guy. I enjoy his humor and that's about it. If you want to watch someone slowly write definitions on the board for 45 minutes, not 50 because he's usually late, this is your guy. If you want to cover one extremely easy in class example per week that is nothing like the assignments or exams, he's your guy. If you enjoy the childish game of the lecturer demanding repeat enthusiastic "good mornings" before starting lecture, also your guy. If you want to lose 20 points on a 30 point question because of one error, he's definitely your guy. The grading for these exams is so absurd. "conceptual fluency" is a joke. Incredible that you can get all the right numbers yet get 0 points on a 30 point question because you did or didn't use a negative sign, extremely ironic when other universities teach this class with opposite definitions of heat and work in/out. If the concepts are so important, why is so much time spent on definition, not concepts or examples? The TA is extremely arrogant and generally not helpful at all. Literally laughs at students questions, then goes back with Young and they laugh about things together. What a great environment for hard studio assignments. You can still easily get a good grade since there's exam retakes plus extra credit, but that says nothing about the quality of the professor IMO. Leaves a ton to be desired.

Christopher Cadou
ENES232

Anonymous
01/01/2022

Lectures are all over the place and hard to follow. Often gets behind on material resulting in learning hw topics the day it’s due, or learning exam topics the day before. Not very forgiving or helpful. Makes an already hard class 10x harder.

Christopher Cadou
ENES232

Expecting a P
Anonymous
07/11/2021

lets be real if this professor can learn how to teach that would be amazing. I couldn’t tolerate his lectures during online school at all because he just kept scrolling his screen and sharing hundreds of equations without solving any relevant problems. His exams were hard af so people had to retake it every other week.

Christopher Cadou
ENES232

Anonymous
06/18/2021

Worst professor I have ever encountered. He was literally driving while zoom lectures and proctoring during exams. Picking up family members is not professional at all while exams and he wasn't reading his emails on time. Worst class just because of the professor take Kathrene or Young and it will be so much better!!

Catherine Hamel
ENES232

Expecting an A-
Anonymous
05/20/2021

Professor Hamel is one of the best ENES teachers I have had. The course content is very interesting to learn about but is also complex. However, Hamel is able to make the content understandable and not that bad. The grading method, conceptual fluency, can be very frustrating at times and probably was more annoying than the content itself. Professor Hamel is one of the very few teachers that want to connect with her students and did so by plays music at the start of class, shared thermodynamic memes, and talked with her students briefly during studio instead of just the assigned work. The memes can be dry at times, but that just shows that Hamel really wants to connect with her students and to make the course as enjoyable and interesting as possible. If you put in the work, ask for help, and do the homework and studios, you are on track for success in the course.

Catherine Hamel
ENES232

Anonymous
05/20/2021

One of the best professors at this school. She manages to teach a complicated and confusing topic in a way that makes it enjoyable and straightforward. The grading method takes some getting use to but it helps in the long run.

Jarred Young
ENES232

Expecting an A
Anonymous
04/08/2021

Young is the GOAT Take any and every class you can with him. Had Young for 102 and 232. He was great in both and makes material understandable. Also, Extra Credit is life saver!

Jarred Young
ENES232

Anonymous
12/17/2020

Cares about his students. Gives a very generous opportunity for extra credit & very willing to explain confusing concepts/help with classwork assignments. Overall a really good experience with him for an online class.

Catherine Hamel
ENES232

Expecting an A+
Anonymous
05/23/2020

Professor Hamel is one of the best professors in the Maryland capstone department. She, not only cares a lot for her student's success, but has the capability of actually teaching her students, allowing them to be successful. Also, a very engaging professor. If at all possible, take this professor for any engineer course possible.

Christopher Cadou
ENES232

Anonymous
07/01/2019

Cadou gets a bad rep but from my experience, he's not as bad as people make him out to be. He goes over MOST of the concepts which is usually good enough and prepares you decently enough for exams if you actually try in discussion and re-do the homeworks, etc.

Catherine Hamel
ENES232

Expecting a C+
Anonymous
01/20/2019

One of the best professors I've ever had, she took one of the most dreaded engineering courses and made it approachable and enjoyable. You can do well in her class as long as you put in an honest effort, but be aware that there is very little curve for the class so you have to do well. I wish I went to lecture more, she even brings candy sometimes. There are so many nuances to this class that even if you do well on the homework, you can still mess up the exam due to small things. Make sure to show up to lecture to learn the tricks around these nuanced things

Catherine Hamel
ENES232

Anonymous
12/11/2018

Really just an all around great professor. She's extremely friendly and helpful, and does her best to make sure her students succeed. Her lecture is easy to follow and engaging.

Kevin Calabro
ENES232

Expecting an A-
Anonymous
06/02/2018

Kevin is probably one of the best engineering professors I’ve had the pleasure of taking. Understand, however, that Thermodynamics is not by any means a pushover class, and so expect to struggle through problems that sometimes take hours. Kevin’s philosophy about homework’s is that if you struggle through it and complete harder questions on your own then you’ll be very well prepared for the exams, which could not be more true. Throughout the class I thought to myself “man this is just a huge pain in the ass why do I have to do this?” Then came the first midterm and I got an A. Material ramps up in difficulty, homework’s are even more irritating and challenging, then came the second midterm and I got an even higher grade. I honestly don’t think I would’ve done half as well in this class had I had any other professor. Always take Kevin if you can.

Raymond Sedwick
ENES232

Expecting an A-
aeroterp
01/02/2018

Dr. Sedwick was overall a pretty good professor and nice guy. His lectures were sometimes difficult to follow, but he was willing to help students out in class by answering questions. I sometimes felt that I had to teach myself some of the material. The homework assignments were the most useful tool for learning the material. He gave the numerical answers to the homeworks, but not solutions. This was helpful in checking work. Quizzes were given during discussion. Most of them were pretty difficult and had low averages. Exams were fair and slightly easier than the homework problems.

Kevin Calabro
ENES232

Expecting a B+
cloak
04/25/2016

Kevin (because that's what he wants you to call him) is by far the best teacher I have had at UMD. His teaching style, note-taking style (exactly what you need, neatly organized, and nothing more or less), and general care about his students as people made him an amazing teacher. I am not one of those people who goes to office hours and tries to talk to my professor because frankly I don't usually need to and don't care, but Kevin is someone who I know actually cares about how well I do and how much I learn and is approachable and helpful. He is one of the few engineering professors who is actually a good person as well as amazing teacher and I 100% recommend him to anyone for any course that he teaches.

Kristen Hines
ENES232

Anonymous
08/18/2015

Hands down once of the worst women I have ever encountered. She was incredibly condesending, insulting, and unprofessional throughout the whole course. She once told me I reminded her of her old boss, because he "was retook thermo and was stupid too." She would insult and gossip about students when they left the room to go to the bathroom, and once spent ten minutes of class explaining how affermative action is the only reason UMD has female engineering students. She is a living walking nightmare; aviod at all costs.

Kristen Hines
ENES232

Anonymous
05/09/2015

I had Hines for 232 and yes she definitely knows what she's talking about but she is very condescending. I went into office hours for the very first time on the first week to ask for help, and when I asked my question she looked at me like I was crazy and that I should've known the answer. If a student asks for help I think that a professor should be wiling to help and not criticize. On top of that, she told me in front of several students that she think I should drop the class. I ended up getting a 92% and therefore a 79.7 in the class, but she still gave me a C. And when I asked her about it, she sent a mass email to all of her sections pointing me out and saying that students like me should not be begging for a grade. I wasn't begging, I just thought that because of my improvement I at least deserved a B in the class.

Kristen Hines
ENES232

Expecting a B
cheesecake
10/17/2014

She's a quirky teacher with a cool personality who clearly loves to teach thermo and wants to see her students succeed. That being said, she is not a great lecturer and her notes are very messy. I find it hard to follow her and consequently feel unprepared and lost when doing homework assignments. I would try to take other professors like Calabro, but she is the only one teaching this semester.

Kevin Calabro
ENES232

Expecting a B
parade
07/31/2014

Kevin is a great lecturer and I really felt comfortable with the material learned from Thermodynamics. However, he is a rather strict grader and gave almost no curve in the class even though there was one exam where our class average was 10% lower than both the other teacher's class averages. I ended up getting a B despite doing very well throughout the semester and I would've imagined I was at least top 15% in the class.

Chandrasekhar Thamire
ENES232

Expecting an A
soheikitsune
05/19/2013

Thamire made this class much clearer than the other professors from what I understand, and also made sure that we knew the material before moving on. I would definitely recommend taking him for any course that you can.

Reviews for ENES232